Disqus aims to aggregate comments across all blogs and web sites by a) providing an easy way for site owners to add the Disqus commenting plugin and b) allowing commenters to create a centralizing profile that can be used on any site that has added their plugin.

It’s a good idea for frequent commenters who participate in discussions on different properties, allowing them to consolidate their comments in a single place. I’ve used my Disqus identity on other sites over the years, and it’s been nice to avoid creating new identities for each site. Having a central profile lowers the bar for discussion, which is, for the most part, a good idea.

This may sound odd to some, but back in 2008, people actually read blogs and commented on posts before Facebook and Twitter consumed all that discussion.

I’ve been happy with Disqus, and their team has been great providing support on rare occasions when their service is having issues.

However, today, I’m turning off Disqus and going back to the standard comments. No worries, comments have been duplicated locally over the years, so I don’t think any have been lost. If any have fallen through the cracks, they’re probably so old, no one will notice.

To be fair, I believe they did notify me of this new feature, but I obviously ignored it. They also provide an option to turn off the feature.

As I said above, I’m happy with Disqus and understand the reasons why they are pushing new features. It’s a business. However, I can’t have any ads here, lest somehow they be construed as endorsement by me or my employer.

Mostly though, I’ve turned off the plugin because I’m a control freak by nature. I’ve learned from the demise and neutering of other services that it’s often better to own my own data, or at least pay someone to manage it.

FWIW, I’ll still keep my Disqus handle, so I can use it on the rare occasion that I decide to comment elsewhere.

Anyway, if you notice that comments are less functional then they were, this is why. I hope that doesn’t ruin your day.

10 Responses to “A Note on Comments”

The reduction in the functionality of the comments has ruined the user-experience of the blog…

Just kidding. I too am a control freak and have kept control of the comments. You might want to consider the “Social” plugin, that gives some integration with Facebook and Twitter. I may have been you that suggested that to me???

interesting… I had to shut down comments on my blog due to the excessive amounts of SPAM comments. I was thinking of moving to Disqus, but might not now. I thought about twitter too, but I get so much spam there it cant be much better.

You might move back tho. Once word gets out that theappslab has to moderate their own comments all heck will break loose

I do lots of presentation and demos to showcase EBS Financials and Procurement. I have been boasting to customers about the 2000+ hours Oracle spent on UX Labs for the new R12 UI. I’ve always been wondering where I can find those people and share info/feedback so I can speak and sell to customers. Now I know. Thanks Jake for the great article! You always make things REAl. It’s so pleasant to read you.